


5 Times, Plus the 1

by f_fandom



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: 5 Times, Aftermath of Torture, Allergies, Ambushes and Sneak Attacks, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, BAMF James T. Kirk, Blood and Violence, Bottom James T. Kirk, Dom Spock (Star Trek), Escape, Explicit Language, Graphic Description, Hostage Situations, Hurt James T. Kirk, Hurt Spock (Star Trek), Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, James T. Kirk Has Issues, Leonard "Bones" McCoy Saves the Day, M/M, Married James T. Kirk/Spock, Medical Conditions, Medical Experimentation, Medical Procedures, POV James T. Kirk, POV Spock (Star Trek), Poisoning, Possessive Spock (Star Trek), Protective James T. Kirk, Protective Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Protective Spock (Star Trek), Psychological Torture, Relived Trauma, Riverside, So much angst, T'hy'la, Tarsus IV, Terrorists, Threats of Violence, Torture, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-12
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-12 15:42:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 20,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29387187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/f_fandom/pseuds/f_fandom
Summary: The obligatory "5 Times Spock Saves Jim and 1 Time Jim Saves Him" story. Let there be angst and protectiveness!
Relationships: James T. Kirk & Spock, James T. Kirk/Spock
Comments: 18
Kudos: 68





	1. Soon is a Relative Length of Time

**Author's Note:**

> check tags for content warnings. I'll try and update them as I post each chapter.

**The First Time**

An away mission had, for once, gone to plan. Until it hadn't. 

Jim groaned from behind the large rock where he was crouched with his phaser. Enemy fire blasted on both sides. He looked across at Giotto, who was behind his own rock face. Jim needed to bring him down more. He was the best security officer they had. Even let Jim call him Cupcake still. Sometimes. Over their missions, they'd built a camaraderie, and Jim knew Giotto's style of guerilla warfare ambush and retreat. With anyone else in hostile situations, Jim would have thought they were crazy. But he was glad to know he wasn't the only one who knew tactics like that. And he knew something was only reckless if it didn't work. And even then, it doesn't mean it was the wrong choice. Giotto took a millisecond peek around the rock into the field and then, jerking his face away from a phaser line, glared at Jim once more and gave the signal for Jim to evacuate. 

"Spock's still in there!" Jim said. "I'm not leaving without him!"

Giotto rolled his eyes, but nodded. Jim knew he was concerned too and didn't want to leave without Spock. He couldn't feel where Spock was precisely through the bond, but he had a general idea. He could sense Spock's calm and focus, trying to figure a way out. Giotto was rocking on his feet, breathing deep and fast, getting ready to split. No.

"No!" Jim shouted. "I want you covering me! When he's safe, you take him and go and do not wait for me. That's an order--do you understand?"

"Captain, I can't--"

"Do you understand?"

Giotto glared and set his lips in a line and that was all Jim needed. Without waiting, he dashed around the side and ran out from cover, staying low to the ground and running as fast as he could toward the last place he'd seen Spock. He didn't exactly blend in well to the grassy hills. Phaser fire flew over his head. One left a scorch burn across his cheek. He smelled burning hair even. More phaser fire came from the opposite direction. Jim didn't look to see if Giotto was making his marks, and he didn't need to. He gathered speed at the brief freedom he got and pushed harder. There, on the other side of the hill, was the cave the planet's inhabitants had been. There. They had Spock in there. 

He rounded some more rocks and saw the opening of the cave. And then something slammed against him with full force. His back crashed into the rocks so hard he felt his ribs fracture. Air wooshed from his lungs and refused to re-enter. Dazed, but high on adrenaline, he raised his phaser and stunned one of them before the other wrenched it from his hand and brought the butt end back across his temple. Jim saw the spray of blood, and the cave...it was sideways--how...and then nothing.

_______________________________

Pain stabbed at his consciousness, jarring him up from the depths to semi-awareness. His arms and shoulders burned, and as he tried to bring feeling into more of his surroundings, he realized he was being held reinforced with his arms over his head. Hanging. Oh. That explained why his shoulders felt dislocated. Was his...shirt gone? Why was his shirt always gone...He couldn't quite move his feet, but he felt that his knees were bent slightly. Which meant he could stand. The air smelled damp and musky. Water was dripping from somewhere, but to Jim it might as well have been a wave beating rocks. He groaned at the wrenching pain in his head, but his throat was dry and it barely came out as a rasp. Hanging expanded his ribcage and put more pressure on the sprains and fractures. He recalled the force of slamming into the rocks. He groaned again and felt something else in his head, somewhere high and distant above the pain. Concern. Fear. For him. Anger.

"Jim. Jim, can you hear me? Ashayam..."

Jim groaned again. "--ock."

"Please open your eyes, Jim."

He tried to focus on where his eyes were and if they were part of everything that felt like it was moving or not. Why couldn't things just stay still for a moment... Spock sounded so far away. He blinked his eyelashes and found them crusted. Something warm and tacky. He blinked harder, getting one eye open marginally. His eyes watered, but the dried blood remained there. He could now feel it down the whole side of his face and neck. He kept blinking, but all he saw was darkness.

"Can't see." 

"We are inside a cave approximately two meters underground. The inhabitants dragged you in, unconscious, and suspended you 23.5 minutes ago. I have spent the last 9 minutes trying to get you to regain consciousness. Are seriously injured, Jim?" 

Spock didn't sound like he was hurt, but Jim knew better. He also sounded angry. Jim turned his face toward the sound of it and shuffled his knees to try and bring his feet under him. He tried and failed to stand and relieve the pressure on his shoulders even a little bit. Spock was breathing heavily through his nose.

"Don’t think so. You okay?" 

Spock didn't reply, but Jim got the answer. He could feel Spock clamped tight, taking him apart with his eyes even in the dark. Possibly wondering why he was with someone so obviously stupid.

"So," Jim said. He swallowed and held back a whimper when he managed to put some weight on his ankles and lean against the wall. "I'm here to rescue you."

More silence. Then a sigh. "Indeed...You should not have returned on your own. It was careless, Captain."

Jim hummed. "More like reckless. But here I am. Giotto and the others will come soon."

"Soon is a relative length of time, Jim."

"To you, yes, I'm learning. You used that word six times last night when I wanted you to stop your teasing and just get on with it."

“And did I not eventually ‘get on with it’?”

Spock blushed through the bond and Jim smiled. But it hurt his head. His voice sounded so strange. He breathed carefully against the sharp spikes of pain with each shallow inhale. His eyes were adjusting to the dim light. 

A noise to their right brought three people near them. The humanoids stared at Jim and Spock. They were armed with phasers as well as other various weapons. Good to see they were so well stocked...

"Can you understand me?" Jim asked, waiting. "I'm Captain James T. Kirk. I'm not here to harm you."

He felt ridiculous spouting his title while hanging against a cave wall, shirtless, bleeding all over the place. The humanoid males showed no reaction to his words. They stepped closer to him and the largest one in front raised a knife. An ugly looking thing, it was around 4 inches long with a bone handle. Jim closed his mouth. 

"Right."

The man stood in front of Jim. Jim really wished he could stand fully upright now so that he'd at least be tall enough. The man leaned close, like he was sniffing. Jim breathed heavier, despite the pain in his ribs. Hanging had his chest pushed outward, defenseless. The knife traced over his body, never touching, as the man studied him. Jim’s shoulders, his chest, down his concave torso, his hips. He touched here and there, making Jim’s skin crawl. He couldn’t hold back a dazed whimper when a cold finger brushed his nipple. A deep and furious growl had them all turning to look at Spock, who gripped the restraints above his head and strained. His teeth bared against his curved lips. Spit flew from his mouth. The man whipped the knife out toward him, as if to motion for silence. Spock just glared and trembled in rage. 

Then the man tilted his head, as if considering. He looked to the two behind him, laughing, and then back at Spock. He brought the knife slowly back toward Jim and watched as Spock's growls rose. Tracing Jim’s navel with the knife, he drew it slowly down his lower abdominal muscle. Jim’s pants fit at his hips and the man, as if further curious, used the knife tip to hook the waistband of Jim’s pants and work them down his left hip. The material slipped over his hipbone and beneath, revealing the smooth dip of muscle where his thigh began. Jim was trying to stay calm, but his breathing grew faster. Erratic. His ribs, already pushed out from the dead weight of hanging, heaved painfully.

Jim couldn’t hear much over the panic flooding his mind, doubled by Spock’s on top of his own. Spock was wild. Jim had never heard him shouting at such a volume, but still, it was muted. His head tipped back to avoid watching as exploring fingers replaced the knife on his hip. He flinched and whined, not prepared for what he knew was coming while his head was already on fire and he couldn’t think straight. He clamped his mouth shut and breathed heavily through his nose. Beside him, Spock had switched to screaming in Vulcan, perhaps even unaware that he’d done so. Jim couldn’t look at him. Didn’t want to see the expression on his face as he was forced to watch. Didn’t want to see a face so frightening and feral it would haunt his dreams. 

Phaser fire sounded somewhere, Jim couldn’t say, didn’t even know which direction was which. The man hastily withdrew his hand from Jim’s pants, and Jim let out a deep breath. The man looked at his companions and then down what must have been a passageway to the left. He screamed something furious in his own language and swerved back to face Spock, pointing his knife at Spock’s neck and baiting him like someone with a spear might bait a caged tiger. The man shook the weapon in Spock’s face, clearly blaming him. One person has already come for him. And now came more.

Then he turned without warning and thrust the knife hard into Jim's left side, burying the blade between his lower ribs. 

**"JIM!"**

Jim froze and grunted like he'd been punched, left unable to breathe. He gasped, drawing air into his lungs, and cried out at the lance-white pain. Spock was shouting his name and thrashing against his restraints so hard that some small rocks crashed down. Jim couldn't hear him clearly over the rushing roar in his ears. He slid and felt the whole weight of his body yank at his already torn shoulders. He cried out again and stared down at that creepy bone handle sticking out of his ribs. He watched it rise with each shallow gasp, smear more and more blood down his side. The blade scraped against ribs with every movement, drawing moans from his throat. He closed his mouth to stop what felt like drool, and then tasted the iron. He knew better than to try and cough when he felt it in his throat, so he gave up lifting his head and let it fall onto his chest. Blood dribbled over his bottom lip, a red trail that snaked down between his pectoral muscles and diaphragm. He let it. Focused on it to center himself. But it wouldn't stop coming. He didn't know if a few seconds or a few minutes had passed. Spock's panic and fury hammered in his mind. He had to clench his eyes shut. He couldn't breathe.

The ground vibrated and hurt what he was already trying so hard to keep still. Everything was moving farther and farther away. No. No, he had to stay conscious. Jim grit his teeth and heaved several short breaths. His head whipped up and against the wall as he screamed through his teeth. He vowed to keep his head up and his eyes open. The humanoids were throwing themselves at Spock, trying to keep him restrained while others ran to meet the commotion. Spock's eyes were black. He ignored the bruising grips on his arms, the hand at his throat. He stared at Jim even as phaser fire lit the passageway somewhere far to their left. Spock was yelling something... Could he listen?

“JIM! Look at me! Keep your eyes on me!” 

Jim coughed once. Hard. And kept breathing through gritted teeth, only opening his mouth when blood rose from his throat. It sprayed through his teeth. It caught in the saliva on the roof of his mouth. It trickled out of his nose—no doubt from when his head had fallen forward. He tried to say Spock’s name, but no sound came out. Spock shook his head wildly, roaring. Jim felt for him. Really he did. He knew what the sight of his blood did to Spock, how badly it wrecked him. He wanted to say he was sorry.

His eyes left Spock's for a second, hazily, as phaser fire filled the room of the cave. Giotto stormed the room with almost a dozen security officers flanking him, securing the perimeter. The humanoids were stunned at Spock's feet before they even had a chance to raise their impressive array of weapons. Giotto holstered his phaser and moved to Spock, motioning for others to let Jim down even as Spock yelled at them to "help the Captain first!" Jim couldn't really see clearly anymore, even though he knew his eyes were still open, just like he'd vowed. All he registered was pain ripping through his shoulders, his wrists bleeding in the restraints and then burning as phaser fire was directed at the chains to break. Then he was free and sliding down the wall, his men grabbing him and lowering him gently. But he cried out, choking on blood as his body changed position and the blade shifted inside him. The officers' hands slipped over his bare skin covered in sweat and blood. His arms were prevented from falling and were slowly, slowly lowered to his sides. Except they wouldn't move right and Jim screamed at the grinding of his dislocated joints. His vision flooded white.

Then all hands let go of him in a rush, moving aside in a flurry of red, and Spock was there instead. Spock. Whose dirty face and wide, panicked eyes swam in and out of focus in front of his own. Spock's hands took his jaw. Framed his face hard, thumbs on his cheekbones. Fingers felt the wound on his head. Then the erratic pulse at his throat. Then one hand moved to his chest, down, pressing oh so gently around the knife still stuck in his side. Jim jolted and cried out. His voice broke off in a gargle, and more blood sprayed from his lips, caught Spock's beautiful nose and cheek with streaks of red. Spock blinked. He trembled and his jaw clenched so tight Jim was afraid he'd hurt himself. No. Spock couldn't be hurt too. Jim's eyes widened. He tried to reach out, but his hand wouldn't move. 

"See?" he gasped. Tried to flash red teeth. "S...oon was...n't...tha’...l...long."

Spock's face clenched in fury, He ground his jaw harder and snarled and squeezed his eyes tight and said nothing. He smoothed Jim’s pants back up his hip, reverently, with shaking fingers, and then lifted Jim from the floor in one move. Arms gripped under his knees and around his back. Hands that had no choice but to grasp his shoulders. The knife twisted and sliced anew as his body was bent in half. Jim let out a choked scream that ended with more gargling blood. Spock's body tightened against Jim's head where it was tucked against his shoulder, under his chin. Spock's uniform was going to get blood all over it. Spock's hands shook, but they held steady, as tenderly as possible, like he knew how much he was paining Jim to carry him. And Jim realized he did. Spock was trying not to bend his torso, trying to keep Jim upright in his arms. The bond tremored and pulsed white with the grinding pain, and Jim felt bad for not being able to control it more. Yet even over the noiseless agony, he could feel Spock everywhere, feel the rush of _myJimnoneveragainnotagainholdonpleaseholdondon'tletgo_. Jim wanted to grip at Spock's uniform, at the strong chest his lax hand fell against. Wanted to feel the material between his fingers.

"We're nearly there, Jim." Spock's voice was thin and ragged. "Please hold on, Jim. We're nearly there to beam back."

Jim squinted against the sudden light of outside, could feel Spock looking down at him in his arms. He could only imagine how pale and wrecked he looked in full daylight. The jarring motion of Spock's running slowly stopped, trying not to jostle too suddenly, but a high whine still escaped Jim's lips and Spock was calming him with shushes and presses of warmth through the bond. Nearby, Giotto spoke into his communicator. His voice cracked only once.

"Two to transport. Beam Mr. Spock with the Captain directly to Sickbay."

"We made it, Jim.” Spock whispered beside his ear and kissed his hair. “We're going home, t’yl’a. Jim? Jim? Ashayam, don't let go. You must stay with me. Stay with me...Jim!"

Jim didn't last through the whole transport. Didn't feel them arrive back on the Enterprise. Didn't hear Bones swearing and popping hyposprays into his neck and telling Spock to lay him on the surgery bed and get the hell out. Didn’t feel his head slip and tip back over Spock’s arm so that blood left his mouth and trickled over his upper lip, his cheekbones, spreading in rivulets over into his ears. Didn't see Spock choking as he let Jim go and stumbled out of the nurses' way, standing with hunched shoulders and fists and eyes that saw nothing but Jim--bleeding, hurting. Dying. How his hand flopped and hung limp off the biobed, his fingers curling loose and smeared in dried blood. Didn't feel the absolute crushing force of fear ripping through the bond, trying to grasp onto anything-something-anything at all and keep him there. The only thing he did experience was much later. 74.9 hours later, as he would be informed.

He shifted his head on the pillow, grimacing at the pounding still present. A movement on his right. Warm fingers touching his. A deep sigh and careful breathing. A voice that shook slightly, unashamedly. He felt _lovereliefjoygratefulnessloveloveangerlove_ and knew Spock was waiting for him to open his eyes. He breathed carefully for a moment, testing the stabbing ache in his side under a thick wrapping of bandages. Blankets pulled to his waist. A thin medical gown. Cool air at his nose that he recognized as a nasal canula, the plastic tube wrapping back behind his ears. When he finally blinked and peered through heavy eyelashes, Spock's eyes were there in anticipation, watering. Jim tried to smile, but he didn't know if it worked or not. Spock held Jim's hand between his own, resting on the bed. He didn't try to raise Jim's hand at all, and Jim noticed the tender ache and numb dissociation running from his shoulders all the way to his wrists, which were also bandaged. His ribs pricked him in his back against the raised bed. Jim blinked at Spock tiredly, taking him in and just working on his breathing. He felt hot. Sweaty hair at his nape. Beads of sweat gathered in the hollow of his throat.

"It is 0200 hours," Spock said very softly. "You have been unconscious after your surgery for over three days."

Jim raised an eyebrow with some difficulty.

Spock sighed and closed his eyes for a moment. "74 hours and 9 minutes. That is how much time has passed since we beamed back from the planet's surface. You faced extensive blood loss, a deep lower lung puncture, three fractured ribs--two broken...in addition to dislocated shoulders, a sprained wrist, and a heavy concussion." 

He breathed hard, having grown more tense with each injury he had to list. His hands shook slightly where they cradled Jim's. "You also faced serious infection in your lung. Doctor McCoy believes your fever should reduce within the next 24 to 36 hours."

Jim heard all this, but was too exhausted and pained to take it in. He moved his forefinger, stroking Spock's. "You...okay?" he whispered.

Spock glared. Hard. And Jim could only lay there and take it. Slowly, Spock shook his head. He blinked several times and stared off at a random point on the bed near Jim's thigh. Jim let him. Against the confusion of loving relief and frightened anger he felt from Spock, he pushed his own hazy and medicated feelings of love and safety, and gratitude. And regret. His apology. Spock closed his eyes and drank in the emotions. The bond pulsed between them, healing, resettling. Seeking to balance and fill in where each was lacking. As it always would. Spock's fingers stroked through Jim's hair, lightly scratching his forehead and caressing--ever careful of the bandage covering his temple. Jim hadn't noticed his eyes falling shut. He rolled them under his eyelids, trying to blink them open again, but Spock's thumb caressed his brow, shushing him. A cool washcloth dabbed his neck, was held against his face, cupping his jaw. Then long gentle waves of ease and safety reached him as Spock lulled him back to sleep and whispered, just before Jim lost consciousness again, that he would be there when Jim woke. And the barest twitch of the corner of his mouth was all Jim could muster for a grateful smile, but he knew Spock saw it. And, despite his mate’s anger that still broiled under the surface, Jim felt Spock’s own version of a smile in return. 


	2. You Owe Me a Dance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jim and Spock are attending a formal Starfleet gala when disaster strikes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Graphic injury ahead

**The Second Time**

"There," Bones said. He thumped the finished bowtie with his finger. "That should do ya."

Jim peered in the mirror again. He twisted his neck and adjusted the collar of his white dress shirt. Bones slapped his hand away and brushed the shoulders of his suit jacket free of any lingering lint.

"You trade one stiff collar dress uniform for another. I'd have thought since you could choose your own formal wear for this thing that you'd have gone a little more...I don't know. Fun? You know, taken advantage of it?"

"This is classy, Bones. You can't go wrong with a suit."

"But a white tuxedo shirt, too? You're gonna look like every other guy there."

"Maybe that's the idea. To blend in at a huge gala where all the brass and their uncles are going to be looking to talk with me about something stupid."

Bones crossed his arms over his chest. "Well, I hate to break it to you, sunshine, but with that Vulcan on your arm, you're not blending in anywhere. Did you shine your shoes?"

"Did I shine my shoes. What do you think I am. Five? Of course I...shit. I was going to."

"They are here."

They both turned when the door opened and Spock entered carrying Jim's black dress shoes. He was wearing traditional Vulcan robes, but it was more like a shawl than a full-length robe. And it was all black, with silver-stitched runes and designs around the edges. The black shirt underneath covered his long neck , making his sharp jaw stand out even more. He was...hot. Jim swallowed and when Spock raised an eyebrow at him he nearly made an undignified sound in his throat. Against his dark eyebrows, deep eyes, and shining black hair, his skin was pale perfection dusted with jade. His eyes turned darker as they looked Jim up and down.

"Jim, you are--"

"A peasant next to you. Like I'm going to fucking prom or something."

Bones rolled his eyes. "I told you."

"You are exquisite," Spock said firmly. He approached with Jim's glossy shoes and knelt down to slide them on. He tied the laces delicately with his long fingers and Jim couldn't even find the voice to tell him to stop, that he could put on his own damn shoes.

"You could," Spock said. "But then you would wrinkle your pants."

"Holy mother of Moses," Bones muttered. "It's like he's fitting fucking CInderella. Your pumpkin is waiting in the hall."

"Don't be an ugly stepsister," Jim said softly, unable to take his eyes off Spock kneeling at his feet. 

Spock straightened once he'd finished and looked Jim up and down again. Slower this time. He let Jim feel what he was seeing, and it made him blush even harder. The white dress shirt pressed smooth and crisp, full across his chest and then tapering down to trim hips and pants that did nothing to hide his firm backside and thighs. The broad shoulders of his jacket that stretched whenever Jim moved. The turned collar and bow tie that cinched right under his Adam's apple and sat in contrast to the flushed, tan skin of his neck, jaw, and face, the barest amount of gel used to keep his blonde hair swept to the side. His bright blue eyes that held Spock's gaze longest.

"Shall we depart, Jim?" Spock asked. He raised an eyebrow in knowing tease.

Jim licked his lips and walked with Spock out the door. "Right. Don't wait up for us, Bones," he said.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don't eat anything you're allergic to. Don't die. Remember, the spell breaks at midnight."

Jim raised a hand in reply and made his way to the transporter room at Spock's side. A few crew members whistled and stared as they passed, and Jim smiled. Spock simply quickened their pace, and only relaxed once they'd beamed down to the reception hall outside Starfleet HQ. The rest of the crew would be leaving for their own free time in the next few hours. They only had two days in San Francisco before heading out again, and the admiralty had been making enough fuss about spring gala for months. It had certainly been decorated lavishly. Floral tresses of dark blue and purple flowers and thick green ivy hung from various locations and draped across tables filled with catered food and drink. Some of the senior staff were, like Jim, dressed in traditional Earth formal wear in different suits and styles, while some had chosen official Starfleet dress uniforms. Many of the women wore full-length ball gowns with their hair arrayed with jewels and in intricately shaped designs. He and Spock were noticed immediately, and the first half hour or so was spent on the niceties and greetings. 

The alcohol was at least real, and so Jim was able to take the edge off of their interactions with the champagne flute he held. It grounded him to hold it, while he kept the other hand behind his back at parade rest. Beside him, Spock stood the same, and Jim marveled at how tight they both were that they couldn't even relax at a social event. That's because it was never just a social event. These types of events were always just guises for political discussions to take place. Jim wondered what new DMZs were being drawn over by the punch bowl. He sighed and set his glass down on a nearby table draped in white. Spock's hand met the small of his back.

"Would you care to dance, Jim?" He nodded across the floor where a group of guests had started dancing slowly to live jazz music. 

"I didn't realize you danced, Mr. Spock." Jim knit his eyebrows and smirked. "It is a very human activity. A very publicly affectionate one."

Spock simply shrugged. "Perhaps. But what Admiral Bennett and his wife and the rest of the couples are doing is not truly dancing, am I correct? Here, standing along the perimeter, we are vulnerable to those who would approach and engage us in unnecessary conversation. Standing in a group of others, simply...swaying, as they are...would ironically leave us more to ourselves."

Jim laughed and took Spock's arm in his. "Yes, it's true that's not quite dancing. And people usually don't interrupt you there. That's quite logical of you." 

Spock, with his head near Jim's, gave a small nod. "Have I told you yet this evening how exceptionally radiant you look, ashayam?"

"You have now." Jim placed his hand over Spock's on his arm instead of kissing him the human way in front of others. "And I'll tell you something else, mister. As taken as I am with you in those serious robes of yours, I'm going to enjoy taking them off even more."

Spock met his eye and blushed as they reached the marble floor and its dim lighting, the flower trellises bathed in shadow and twinkling chandelier light. He opened his mouth to reply, but Jim never heard it. The explosion blast that detonated from the side of the room overcame everything in a deafening, blinding force. Jim was blown off his feet, away from Spock, as the floor broke apart. Heat burned everywhere. The air sizzled alongside people's screams of terror. Smoke and dirt and debris filled the vicinity in rolling plumes of ash.

All Jim knew was pain and shock and a ringing in his head that felt like knives behind his eyes. He could feel his scream through the vibration in his sternum and his throat, but he couldn't hear it. His eyes were clenched shut against layers of grime and wetness, probably blood. He had no idea where he'd landed or how or what direction the floor or the ceiling was. He tried to move and didn't know if he'd succeeded or not. Only that it sent fresh waves of agony through his body. And he was burning, something was burning. He tried to open his eyes and got a vision full of dirt and muted light and flames of fire. A trellis of flowers hung from the wall still, but on fire and falling piece by piece. A mountain of debris blocked his view and he could only bring one arm up to try and wipe his eyes. He just smeared grime and blood. His jacket sleeve, once black, was nearly white in chalk and dust, and ripped up the forearm. Blood was everywhere and he couldn't tell where he'd been hurt, if it was even his. And Spock, where was Spock? 

He tried calling for Spock in his mind, reaching to find him and grab hold. He screamed Spock's name out loud, but choked on dust and realized he couldn't speak at all. Couldn't breathe. He finally tried to lift his head and that's when he recognized the pile of rubble he was buried under. He tried to turn his head and met a slab of rock. Concrete and plaster and iron and wooden beams were completely covering him. With the arm that wasn't stuck, he shoved at a piece of debris blocking most of his view. It singed when he touched it, melting into his palm, and he yanked his hand back with a scream. A large beam of wood was on fire a few feet above him, propped on top of other debris. Something was crushing his torso, his hip. His legs were twisted underneath him. He couldn't even feel them to move them. He managed to kick one of his feet and then screamed. His left arm was pinned in the rubble. He tried to stay calm and focus on breathing, but smoke kept relentlessly at his face, making his eyes water. Sound was returning and he could hear screams everywhere. More rubble falling. A siren.

The rubble on top of him shifted. Whatever was crushing his stomach fell under yet more pressure and Jim hear the snap of his ribs, felt a portion of them give way. Air and blood pushed up from his mouth. He couldn't scream. He couldn't think. He was going to die here, literally under Starfleet, and Spock would never--he still couldn't feel Spock. He couldn't focus any thoughts, but he screamed _Spock!Spock!Spock!_ over and over in his mind until the rhythm took over for him and he didn't know if 30 seconds or 30 minutes had passed. But then he was there.

"JIM! Jim, hold on!"

"Sir, this is a mountain of rubble!" someone else shouted. "How do you know he's underneath all this? If he is, he's probably already--"

"Dig! Damn you!" Spock shouted. "Help me dig! You will help me get him out of here!"

Rocks. Rocks were tumbling. Rolling across metal and ruined marble. It sounded so far away. He couldn't turn his head to cough out the blood in his throat, the smoke that was coming faster now. _Spock!_ he tried to scream again.

"I am here, Jim! We are almost to you! Can you hear me, Jim? Hold on!"

And Jim could hear him. Spock was grunting and beating against the debris, tearing it away with his hands. Metal clanking told him others were using tools. Someone was extinguishing the flames, but the beam right above his chest, still blocked by large debris, continued to whip flames and heat. A few feet to the side, a large piece was pulled away. The rubble shifted again and the beam broke where it was burning through. It fell on him hard and Jim screamed, not even from the flames covering it and now eating through his clothes and skin, but from the immense heat and weight of the structure itself. He couldn't even writhe enough to work away from it as he screamed. It crushed him and seared him and burned him and Spock was screaming along with him.

"I can see him!" someone shouted as another large piece of rubble fell away. "Captain Kirk! Captain, close your eyes! Close your eyes!"

Jim's eyes were already closed, clenched shut as he screamed, but then the extinguish blast of air ripped through and he still couldn't stop screaming even as the flames died and his exposed head and shoulders were doused with chemicals. Bright light, though muted Jim could tell even through his eyelids, filled the darkness suddenly. Thick material brushed his face. There were voices, hands reaching, and the beam was lifted from his chest and pulled away. He heard it thunk in the pile of concrete somewhere behind him. Then...

"Move aside! Work on the other side now! Quickly!" 

Fingers at his forehead. So gentle. But he could hardly feel them. His free arm was sprawled painfully on a rock beside him. He was shaking, hurting so badly and trying to stay conscious now that Spock had found him. Spock was there. The fingers on his face were at his meld points, barely touching, but searching. He felt Spock in the white-washed expanse of their mindspace, grabbing him, tugging the light harder. He felt Spock diving through his pain, experiencing it, screaming with it, at it, looking for the worst damage.

"Jim! Jim, stay with me! Jim, can you look at me? I need you to open your eyes for me, t'yl'a."

Spock's fingers delicately wiped the grime from his eyes, and when Jim blinked and could finally opened his eyes, he saw Spock's face over his, upside down from his position on the ground, but utterly wrecked. Green trickling from his forehead, his beautiful pale skin marred by dust and grime, coating the fine lines around his eyes and mouth and forehead. Tear tracks through the muck on his cheeks. His eyes so dark and worried. Jim saw himself through Spock's eyes, looking much the same. But red, red everywhere. His blue eyes were too light against the chalky mess of debris. Dim. Spock grabbed his free hand, but it was burnt from trying to move debris off of himself. Spock's fingers touched his seared, gooey flesh, and they both cried out, and then Spock's face crumpled with remorse as he tried to free the hand gently, lay it back on the debris. He forced his face to become calm and centered, though his mouth still trembled.

"Jim. Can you hear me? Speak to me, ashayam. Focus on me."

Spock swore and worked at his bowtie, trying to remove it and relieve any pressure on his throat. All Bones's hard work. Spock untied the last of it, not wanting to rip it away and risk hurting Jim. His fingers opened Jim's collar and felt along his throat for a pulse. Spock shook his head as if he'd made a mistake. Then readjusted his first two fingers and tried again at Jim’s faltering pulse. He ripped open the top two buttons, searching, but the shirt had melted into areas of his chest where the burning beam had fallen. Jim felt the shirt pull at his skin, but it didn’t register beyond the agony everywhere else. Spock's fingers shook and he laid the material back down, gripping his hand in a fist.

"It is all right, Jim. It will be all right," he kept repeating. But Jim didn't believe him.

“Spock” Jim whispered. It cost him volume in his lungs and he was crushed further. Jim felt the blood shoot up his throat and rush out both sides of his mouth. He tried to close his mouth and sputtered, spraying blood as he tried and failed to breathe in air. His wide eyes fixed on Spock, trying to tell him what was happening, what he felt and knew and had to accept.

Spock’s face became viscous. He snarled and gripped the debris beside Jim’s head so hard that it broke. _I’m so sorry. So sorry_ , Jim pushed in his mind. Spock’s face broke further.

“Unacceptable!” he growled.

"We're almost there!" Another voice. Spock jerked his head in a nod without breaking eye contact with Jim. 

"Careful!" someone shouted.

Then the heavy debris still covering Jim shifted again. His hips, where they'd been twisted and crushed on their side, were rolled over. The weight shifted his entire mangled body and he was crushed fully flat on his back. Jim felt himself scream, heard it cut off in blood. His twisted legs cracked. The slab crushing his stomach cut and scraped. His body tried to arch away from the agony, but there was nowhere for it to go. Spock was screaming, scraping his nails at the slab where it crushed Jim, trying to get his hands under it. He jabbed his fingers into the sodden red shirt at Jim’s rib cage, which should have been pushed outward with him flat on his back like he was. Jim didn’t know where the air came from for him to be screaming so loudly. Spock was beside himself with madness. Then he was moving debris aside, lowering himself into the miniscule space, pushing up on his hands and knees, trying to raise the slab on his back alone. Other people were shouting louder now. 

"Get that lever in there! He's going to break his back! Get it in there! Push!"

Slowly, the pressure lifted from Jim's torso. The slab came off, but the release brought more pain, and he couldn't breathe even now that he had room to. Barely conscious, he watched rescue officers rotate the heavy piece of debris to clear it. Too heavy to tip, it had to be twisted around to the side before they could drop it. Jim watched the concrete, smeared in blood and dust, pass over his face as it was moved, since they couldn't risk moving him out from under it. If they dropped it, if the lever slipped, he was dead. Finally they got it far enough away to let it fall. Spock was still there by Jim's side, breathing heavily, his face contorted in pain. Jim didn't want to think what the weight had done to his back. His other arm was now free, but he couldn't move it. He wanted to reach Spock's hand. Spock was staring at him, shaking. Jim thought it odd--he'd been shaking earlier, and now he couldn't even move a finger.

Spock's hands, trembling, lifted the sides of what was left of his suit jacket, exposing his chest and stomach. The crushed bones, the white dress shirt drenched red and scorched with burns. The skin underneath black and blistering and bleeding. Spock choked and coughed, but Jim felt the furious agony from Spock's mind that told him it was a sob. Spock was crying, unable to hide it. Jim felt none of the mortification he expected from Spock at being so compromised—only pure grief and rage and hopelessness. Spock's beautiful robes were destroyed and torn white with chalk dust. He ripped the elegant shawl from his shoulders, flipped it inside out, and laid it gently over Jim's mangled torso. He cupped the side of Jim's face and wiped more grime from it, cleared the blood from his lips. Jim could only watch him as his gaze slid in and out of focus, listening to the rush of _pleaseJimpleasenoIcan’tletthishappenpleasenohavetosave_. Far below Jim it seemed, the crushing weight over his broken hip and legs was lifting. Jim couldn’t feel that as much, though he still grimaced and heaved for minuscule amounts of air. Spock spared a glance at Jim's freed lower half and when he turned back, his dark eyes had hardened even further. The shaking left his hands. His face stilled into fierce determination and grief. Jim didn't need to see his body to know how bad it was. If he hadn't been able to feel it, Spock's broken devastation and horror, never this easily shown, confirmed it.

"It is all over now, Jim," he whispered. "You are safe. You are going to be just fine. Stay focused on me. I _beg_ you, t’ yl’a."

Jim could only see clearly in one eye, and Spock's face was already hazing out of focus. He blinked and tried to look on at him. He could hear the strange little gasps coming from his chest, the hot liquid that ran fresh every time he spasmed and expanded his crushed ribs and lungs. His chest seared and he could feel the flesh continuing to melt away as the burn settled deep under layers and layers of skin. He realized for the first time something under his back, digging. The back of his shirt was growing wet. He tried to move his lips, but he couldn't. Spock's hands were framing his face hard now, his head injuries irrelevant from the main task of keeping Jim conscious. His hands smeared under layers of Jim’s blood.

“How is he still alive?” someone asked.

“He’s not going to make it!”

“Silence!” Spock screamed. “Where are the medics?” Then he turned back to Jim’s body.

"Please, Jim," Spock whispered, broken. His nose touched Jim's and he closed his eyes for a brief second. "Please stay with me. The medics are approaching. Doctor McCoy is meeting us on the Enterprise. He is ready. You are going to be fine, Jim. Please, t’yl’a. Please."

Something stilled in Jim's chest. He had no warning. His eyes widened in shock and Spock’s face registered his distress. His mouth was moving. Jim felt bad for whomever he was shouting at. There was another man above Jim's head, peering into his eyes with a penlight. But his eyes had rolled back in his head. A hypo was released into his neck once someone wiped blood from his skin to clear a spot at his carotid. Then another two hypos. More voices.

"Captain Kirk? Can you hear me? Can you blink once if you understand?"

"We need to move him now! We're losing him! Where's that damn shuttle craft?"

"No time! We have to emergency transport."

"It's not safe in his condition!"

"Jim, t'yl'a, hang on. I am with you. Hang on, Captain. Do not leave me. I will not let you leave."

"All right, prepare to transport! In 3...2...1."

"Please, no! Hang on, my Jim."

Lights. Flashing. Dirt and blood everywhere. Harsh white sounds. Fingers on his face. Spock. Panic in his mind that wasn’t his. He doesn’t have enough energy to panic. Attempts at warmth and calm sent his way. Faltering. Cold. Beeps and shrill machines whirring. Swearing. Bones. Metal against his skin. Prodding. Cutting. Patches of clothes pulled away, taking skin with it. Tricorder noises. More hypos. Plastic covering his nose and mouth. Oxygen mask. No way to use it. Diaphragm won’t take in air. Gloved fingers at his stomach. Blood, hot and scorching. Machines beeping, make them stop. Not beeping. Droning. Loud ringing, all together, the same off-key note. Long sustained note. Spock shouting his name from a distance. Something crashing into a wall. A gut-wrenching _"NO!"_. Cold metal flat against his chest, already burnt. Hard. Electricity slamming into his body, arching him off the biobed. More machine droning. More screaming in his head. The metal returns. Please no. Again he screams in silence. His torso slams the bed. Bones is yelling at him to breathe, damnit. The plastic on his face isn’t cold anymore. Sticky. Filling with liquid. It's moved aside. Blood spills. It's replaced by a heavier mask. But the oxygen isn't oxygen. He’s fading. Spock is livid with fear in his mind. He feels Spock hit the floor on his knees. Hears a sobbing wail that makes him want to cover his ears. He wants to tell Spock it will be okay. Someone help Spock’s back. He's hurt too. Spock...help me.

_____________

Voices. Clearer than before. Bones. He hurts everywhere. And machines are still beeping everywhere. Plastic over his nose and mouth still. Bone and skin regenerators attached to his body. The bed feels softer. And he feels clean, no longer sticky with coated grime and dust. His chest is bare. Plastic tubes everywhere. Thin sheet pulled to his waist. Bandages. Casts. Blood.

"If you had gotten him here even five minutes later, Spock, I mean it. I don't know what you were thinking lifting building debris with your damn back, but if it got Jim out faster, then I'm glad you did. Once he recovers a bit, I've got him prepped for more surgery. I'm going to have someone checking around the clock to monitor progress on all his internal organs, make sure they're not bleeding again. The ribs are holding and so are the lungs. I hope I won't have to intubate him again. I think everything he breathed in has been cycled out. The burns are bad. Real deep. But with enough regen, the scars shouldn't be too severe."

A hand presses against his forehead, feeling. Then the backs of fingers. A frustrated sigh. More fingers prodding and feeling. Machine beeps growing faster.

"He's in there, Spock. He's fighting."

A different hand. Longer, gentler fingers on his bandaged hand, petting. Jim wants to move his finger in response.

"What of the damage to his legs?"

"That's what the next round of surgeries is for. Initial nerve regeneration saved him from paralysis, but that shrapnel in his back came awful close. He's still immobile from the waist down, but once the femurs and knee tendons start healing, we'll have more to work with. This second round I'm going to go in and finish fixing his hip and repairing the nerve damage there. Based on the injury, that weight alone should have killed him. Are they any closer to catching the bastards who did this?"

"Starfleet..." A shaky breath from Spock. "Starfleet has identified the terrorist cell, but not the individual members responsible for the bomb attack. 23 people have died and more numbers are coming in. I...I feared the worst when I realized that Jim was buried beneath the rubble from the wall collapse. Removing him safely was..."

"I can't imagine what you went through to see him like that. I know Jim's tough, but based on his injuries, I can't imagine what you must have witnessed. You're damn lucky yourself."

"I do not count myself lucky, Doctor. I had to watch him fight for his life while it was literally being crushed out of him. Listen to his strangled screams while I could not reach him. How his voice gave out more and more. Drowning in his own blood...And when the burning debris collapsed on him, I was afraid I was going to have to witness him burn to death right before my eyes. I do not know how much he will be aware of the incident. He was fading in and out of consciousness. I became...compromised. The rescue crew are right to report me."

"Those charges won't stick. If they think what you did was harassment, then they should just be glad I wasn't there. It was a traumatic disaster for everyone. And whatever happened, Spock, you saved him. Jim knew you were there, and that's all that mattered to him... Now. When's the last time you slept?"

"I cannot. I will not leave him. I have not since I brought him in 3.4 days ago, and I will not now."

A very long and tired sigh. "I could list all the ways I could officially have you removed and confined, but I won't bother. I never said anything about leaving him, you green-blooded moron. But no more sitting in that chair staring at him. That bed. Right there beside him. You sleep in it or I'll sedate your ass. And don't think I'm not monitoring you."

____________

Waking up the next time was far easier, though it still brought waves of pain into his consciousness and took some time to work his way past it. There wasn't a single area of his body that didn't hurt. His bones throbbed, and every breath sent spikes through his entire torso. Sound was still muffled, but he could make out a rustling to his right. Then Spock's fingers took his hand. Gently.

"Jim?" he whispered. "Jim, it is all right. You are safe."

Another hand stroked his forehead. He felt stubble on his chin and jaw. He blinked several times behind his eyelids and then slowly worked them open into a wince. The oxygen mask was still over his mouth and nose. He moaned into it, but his throat rasped and he began coughing. tightening his whole body as his chest felt like it was splitting in two. He moaned louder, his head and shoulders curving forward, and Spock's hands took up place on his upper back and chest, holding him steady. Then Bones was there, moving aside the curtain in the soft light of his hospital area, and Jim shook his head "no" at the hypospray even as tears ran down his face.

The hypo hissed at his neck and within two agonizing gasps, he was breathing easier. He couldn't stop the small sounds of hurt and exhaustion with each heavy exhale. Spock eased him back onto the bed, but the grip on his shoulder was just short of painful. His eyes were blown wide and dark with the worry Jim saw in them far too often. 

"Now let that be a lesson to you," Bones said. "No talking. All that smoke took a number on your esophagus and lungs. And do you know how much blood I had to pump out of your stomach? We've been pumping it back in for the past 6 days. I just finished putting your insides back together, so please, do me a fucking favor and try not to rip yourself open again."

Bones sighed and shoved his hands in the deep pockets of his medical jacket. "I don't have it in me for the speech this time, kid. Of all the places to get blown up at, you can't even go to a goddamn gala. I don't care how it happened. It's not supposed to happen. Mother of Moses, Jim...I just..."

Jim twitched a finger and moved his free hand on the bed. Bones saw it and covered it with his own. He closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, they were wet even in the soft light.

"I'm gonna take care of you, don't you worry. But if you work that needle out of your arm, I'm gonna put it someplace you really won't like. I...I'll let Spock explain the rest to you. He's been here for so much of it I'm ready to put him to work myself."

"I have no desire to serve in a medical fashion, Doctor."

Bones glared. "Just make sure he goes to sleep. And don't even think about any hanky panky. Remember, I'm watching."

Bones walked away mumbling, and Jim chuckled and then grimaced. Spock's fingers caressed the side of his face. Jim melted into the touch and worked to keep his eyes open. Spock was pale with stress, dark smudges around his eyes that had little to do with sleep. His perfect hair needed a good brushing. His regulation blacks were wrinkled, too. 

"I am very grateful to see you awake, Jim," he said, his voice cracking unashamedly. "You have been in very critical care this week. You suffered extensive damage from the explosion, as you were aware. Most of your injuries have been repaired and now need only time to heal. Your legs were broken in multiple places and will take longer to heal due to the nerve repair procedures Doctor McCoy completed. And you faced serious third degree burns, but that has been tended to as well. It will feel tender and uncomfortable as the new skin grows, but should not leave any lasting visible damage."

Spock traced gently over the bandages encasing Jim's chest. He rested his hand there, watching it rise and fall as Jim breathed. Shallow. Tentative. But unobstructed. He skimmed the bandages further down.

"Your ribs are nearly fully repaired, as are your internal organs. The stomach and kidneys were the worst of the internal injuries, apart from the damage to your lungs, but all are healing now. You face at least another week's bed rest before we begin physical therapy, but Doctor McCoy does not foresee that taking very long either."

Jim brought his other hand up sluggishly, the muscles weak and uncoordinated. He moved the oxygen mask aside slightly and gave his best Captain glare when Spock tried to move it back.

"Do not try to speak, Jim."

"Are you...okay?" Jim breathed. He knew Spock heard. He coughed slightly and grimaced, but kept his eyes on Spock. Spock's hand faltered at Jim's face. His mouth opened and closed and he furrowed his brow.

"I am fine, ashayam. I did not sustain lasting damage from the attack or from my efforts to rescue you. I should have done more. I should have found you faster--"

"You found me." Jim took up Spock's hand. Spock looked at it and then pressed it to his face, his lips. He closed his eyes and Jim continued.

"You found me. You saved me...I felt you. I'm here. I'm right here." He had to pause for breath. He let the oxygen mask cover his face for a moment while he breathed. Then he took as deep a breath as he could before the pain started up, and he moved the mask again.

"Why do you expect the impossible from yourself when I don't? We were in a terrorist attack. I heard you telling Bones. There is nothing more you could have done or known to save me. You're here. With me. Now."

He wanted to know more about the attack. He wanted to know what Starfleet had uncovered, how long the casualties list had grown, what theories Spock had on the matter. But he couldn't get his brain to string coherent thoughts together. And it wasn't what was most important. Spock was still so rattled. He shook his head. His beautiful face scrunched like he was fighting a migraine. He held Jim’s hand tenderly, but shook in his arms and shoulders.

“I almost lost you.” Spock’s breath hitched. His tears rolled over Jim’s fingers, wetting the bandage. Jim tried to move his thumb to wipe them away.

“You didn’t, sweetheart. I’m right here. I’m okay. C’m here.”

Spock released Jim’s hand and leaned his head down onto the pillow beside Jim's face. He breathed deep and long against Jim's neck. Jim knew he probably smelled of sterile cleanser and sickbay fabric. Too clean. Devoid of all the personal scents from their quarters, his shampoo, Spock's scent itself infused in his skin. He felt awful thinking of all Spock had endured this past week on his account. Jim reached out and found Spock's thigh beside the bed. He patted it and squeezed weakly. One of Spock's hands moved from his shoulder down to meet it, gripping around the bandages but trying not to squeeze, and they stayed like that for a long while, with Spock slumped over most illogically (and yet, Jim thought, adorably) burying his face on Jim's pillow. 

Eventually, Spock's breathing calmed and he seemed settled enough to raise his head. He moved aside Jim's oxygen mask and kissed him. Jim felt his mouth scrape across the stubble on his cheek. Jim's dry, chapped lips kissed back, and he breathed in Spock's air. It was gentle and reverent. It needed more. Then Spock drew back and replaced the oxygen mask while Jim gasped and mumbled curses. 

“No hanky panky unless you finish it,” Jim breathed. The mask mumbled his words even more, but he knew Spock still got the gist.

Spock stroked Jim's cheekbone with his thumb and smiled. Tired and shaken. But content now that Jim was on the mend. Jim could feel himself drifting off again. The machine above his head hissed and administered another dose of morphine. It eased the deep aching and warmed his veins. He sighed in relief and Spock's thumb halted in worry and sadness before resuming. 

While he was still able to, Jim reached up and moved the oxygen mask one more time, opened his eyes. Spock's concerned gaze was still on him, and he raised an eyebrow. Jim tried to smile, but it didn't quite work.

"I'll be out...of here in no time," he whispered.

"Yes, Jim."

"And I want a new suit. And you...you need new robes."

"Yes, Jim."

"Cause you owe me a dance."

Spock's thumb paused again. He breathed deeply and his eyes relaxed. He kissed the corner of Jim's mouth and replaced the oxygen mask. He leaned close and nuzzled Jim's cheek, his ear, his hair. Jim leaned into the touch. Spock continued nuzzling the side of Jim's face, gently planting kisses and possessive sniffs to reacclimate Jim's scent. He showed no intention of stopping, and Jim drifted off to the comforting sensation.

"Yes, Jim." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I loved playing with the notion of Spock's hot appearance in all black when he shows up on the Enterprise in The Motion Picture and everyone is practically speechless. 
> 
> Also, if you think Spock doesn't curse, I loved basically playing with his line to General Korrd in The Final Frontier when he says, "Damn you, sir! You _will_ try!" When it comes to rescuing Jim, the guy will tell you what's what lol!


	3. How's That For Truth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spock rescues Jim from anti-Federation militants who possess some nasty bioweapons and decide to test them out on the Captain.

**The Third Time**

Spock peered around the corner of a dilapidated building, down the ruin of what once was a street and now showed all the evidence of war destruction. Rubble filled the vicinity, and Spock’s black pants were caked in dust that was still settling in the air. He studied the location up the hill where he’d last seen Jim. The location where the blast radius began. They’d come to answer a distress signal of a pending Federation colony that faced militants and raids protesting the presence of Starfleet. In addition to ground attacks, the militants occupied power stations that targeted the Enterprise in orbit. 

“Shields at 15%,” Uhura warned over the communicator. 

Spock didn’t like what he was going to have to do next, but he didn’t see any other options, and the safety of the Enterprise was paramount.

“Mister Scott,” he said. “Take the Enterprise out of orbit and remove to a safe location. I will continue my search for the Captain here. Maintain radio silence with the planet, and update Starfleet of our situation. In 2 hours, return to orbit and I will attempt to contact you at that time. Continue scanning what you can and transfer data to my tricorder while you still have a stable signal. Confirm.”

“Aye, Mister Spock,” Scotty said. Spock could hear the reluctance in his voice, and knew the Engineer was aware of his own dissatisfaction with the decision. 

“Confirmed, Mister Scott. Spock out.”

Spock continued his advance up the city’s hillside, glancing at topography information and life sign readings from his tricorder. He tried, as he’d been attempting for the past 10 minutes, to reach Jim through the bond. It sat eerily silent in his mind, so disturbing that he felt unbalanced as he proceeded. He refused to analyze the series of possibilities as to why he could not reach Jim, but when he reached the clearing of the blast sight, he had no choice.

Generous amounts of blood smeared the gravel and stones. It glistened in the dust, showing it was still relatively fresh. After confirming with his tricorder that the blood was indeed Jim’s, he found Jim’s phaser and communicator nearby. They’d been ground to pieces. Controlling his breathing, Spock looked back at the red spatters, the evidence of violence and harm against his mate. His jaw clenched and he crouched down toward the blood for a moment, reaching out. His fingers touched the warm liquid and he closed his eyes, again reaching out for Jim. He was met with silence. 

Refusing to waste any more time, Spock sprang to his feet and began running silently up the trail. Here and there, a segment of gravel shifted, but Spock’s balance and precision let him move with deadly stealth. A large hidden structure appeared on the right, broken down and abandoned. But Spock knew there were life signs inside. The light was still bright in the late morning, and he clearly spotted two guards with phaser rifles. Easily passing them by, Spock snuck around to the back, toward the isolated life sign he saw. The building was constructed into the wall of the hill, possibly leading to more tunnels and connections. Spock slipped into an opening and, still crouched with his phaser ready, entered the dark tunnel until he came to a series of jail cells. He blinked to adjust to the dim lighting and darted toward the cell nearest him where he saw a huddled figure.

The cells were small, and in the center of one, Jim laid sprawled out on his front, as if he’d been tossed in. Blood smeared over his face and neck, spotting the dirt around him. His arms and legs were twisted underneath him uncomfortably. One arm curled out to the side. His hand left finger strokes in the dirt. His right hip was raised with his leg pushed under him in a similar fashion. He wasn’t moving. Spock ached deep in his core to see Jim so still. It defied everything he knew for Jim to be robbed of his natural animated state. So unlike when he was asleep beside Spock, his body still but relaxed, moving softly and safely as he breathed. This unconsciousness was not peaceful. Spock reached through the bars, trying to touch him, grab ahold of his sleeve.

“Jim!” he hissed quietly. “T’hy’la, wake up. Jim, can you hear me? Jim! Captain!”

He was only two inches away from touching Jim, but a sudden noise down the corridor interrupted his efforts. Footsteps approached and Spock grudgingly retreated into the shadows, waiting to watch. Two men appeared and unlocked Jim’s cell to enter it. Spock gripped his phaser and, with two single blasts, stunned both of the guards. He didn’t wait to listen if the noise of their falling had alerted anyone. He dashed into the cell, stepping over them, and dropped to Jim’s side. He rolled him over gently and spared a few seconds to examine his head wounds. Three deep gashes matted his hairline and still bled sluggishly. Jim’s face was contorted in unconscious pain, and he didn’t stir when Spock gripped the side of his face and rubbed a thumb over his cheekbone. In the dim lighting, his pale face looked even worse. Spock resisted the urge to draw him close to his chest and smooth his hair and cover his face and neck in healing kisses, revered attention and devotion that the bond drove him to fulfill as his t’hy’la duty. Now wasn’t the time, he reminded himself.

A noise behind him had him swerving around, planting himself defensively in front of Jim’s body with his phaser raised. Two more men stood outside the cell, their own phasers pointed at Spock. He only had half a second to curse himself for not firing immediately before the blast hit him and he felt his body slam against the cell bars into darkness.

____________________________

When he awoke, Spock blinked rapidly and catalogued his minor injuries while straining to remember what had happened. Then his head snapped up to find he was sitting in a chair in a wide room. His arms were tied behind the chair. Rope wrapped around his torso to the chair and secured his ankles to the legs of the chair. The restraints were not the kind he could break. They had made sure of that. About 10 feet away from him, facing him in the room’s dim light, Jim was similarly constrained, but his head drooped down on his chest. He was still unconscious. Sitting upright had caused the blood to drip down from his neck onto his chest, staining his gold uniform even more than the dirt and dusty grime had already done. 

“Oh, good. One of you is up at least.”

A man of unimpressive stature compared to the guards came around into Spock’s view. His platinum blonde hair slicked over his head in far too much product, and his black clothes had a tailored fit to them. Leather pants and boots, as well as a black leather jacket with coat tails. Fingerless gloves covered his hands as he stroked his chin, observing. Make-up around his eyes further aggravated his look. He looked Spock up and down and then moved to stand by Jim. He lifted Jim’s head up by his hair.

“Still out of it, huh?” His voice rolled in fake saccharine and amusement. He laughed through his nose and turned to Spock. He leaned his face down next to Jim’s and held his lax face in one hand. Spock shook to see those fingers gripping Jim's jaw so roughly, touching what was not his.

“He doesn’t like ketamine, does he?" Marco asked. "I didn’t give him any more than I usually administer to people, but he had a funny reaction to it. Started seizing all over the place. So I gave him some more to knock him out. I thought he was going to die on us there for a bit.”

The man shoved Jim's head forward again and stood up to say something to his guard. He looked at Spock, still smiling, and Spock memorized every feature of this man’s face in order to hunt him down and make sure he would never get away with hurting Jim. To touch Jim in any fashion was unacceptable. But to harass his unconscious body while he was unaware and incapable of defending himself--it was sickening.

“The name’s Marco,” the man said. “And I can’t say I love what you’ve done with the place. We told them not to trust the Federation and now look what happened. You made us blow them up. We won’t stand for that here.”

“You destroyed a town of your own people rather than negotiate with Starfleet.” Spock spoke tightly through his mouth, his jaw set hard. “Your militant occupation is illogical. The Federation will retaliate.”

“I do hope so,” Marco said. “Your pretty ship left orbit a bit ago. Did you send them away? Good Vulcan. And then you came for your Captain. Such a pretty thing...Oh, yes. Thank you, Charles.”

He took a full syringe from one of the guards who had left the room to recover something. 

“His name isn’t really Charles. I just like calling him that.” Marco waved the syringe in the air and looked down at Jim in disappointment. “Now, I haven’t done this before, but I believe you have to put a lot of effort behind it. Adrenaline’s a bitch.”

Spock’s eyes widened, and before he could do anything from his tied position, Marco swung his fist down and stabbed the large needle into Jim’s chest. His fist landed with a hollow thud against Jim’s sternum. Spock watched in horror as the drug was administered. Marco motioned for the guards to come hold the chair steady and, only a few seconds later, Jim erupted to life. His head flew back as he took in huge gasps of air over and over, and his hair fell in disarray. His long limbs shook against the restraints, and his eyes blinked wide. He groaned in pain even through hyperventilating and the guards released him. One had dug his hand into Jim’s shoulder to further restrain his seizure, and his uniform creased where the thick fingers had gripped. 

Spock reached for Jim’s frantic mind, holding him steady and pushing comfort and stability. Jim’s eyes, blown wide with his pupils as shrunken as pinpricks, slowly focused and found Spock’s gaze. Still breathing heavy, he took in Spock’s position and restraints, then looked down at his own. He stared at the syringe lodged above his breast. Finally, he glared up at Marco as he gasped and tried to control his breathing. Marco smiled and jerked the syringe free from Jim’s chest. Jim cried out and pursed his lips, trying to breathe through his nose and control himself. Marco watched, amused, until Jim slumped against the restraints, completely depleted of energy.

“What the hell,” Jim ground out. “Who are you? Where am I?”

“I’m the one you’re going to talk Federation to,” Marco said. “You can call me Marco. I’ve already introduced myself to your Vulcan. I feel like we’ve been friends forever now, but I must say, I don’t think he likes me.”

“He’s a pretty good judge of character.” Jim clenched his eyes shut and breathed heavily, in obvious pain.

“I’m sure you think so,” Marco said. “But now that you’re awake— _finally_ —we can get to today’s order of business. Now I know your type. You’re not going to say anything no matter how many times and ways I ask. You’re the stubborn Starfleet type. You eat torture for breakfast, don’t you. So we’re just going to skip that whole dramatic stage and get to the heart of the matter.”

Marco waved his hand and “Charles” stepped forward again with a different syringe. Jim eyed it in between clenching his eyes shut and trying not to make any noises. Spock could only imagine what the drugs were doing to his system. Jim hadn’t really met his gaze much yet, and Spock knew he was trying not to distract himself. Both he and Spock now had an obligation to figure a way out of this without getting emotionally compromised.

“I don’t know what the actual name for this is.” Marco played with the syringe and held it up to the light. “I just like to call it my handy dandy truth serum. Cause let me tell you, darling, it works. I had to pay _big_ money to get this from the Orions. Just some of this here and you’ll be telling me everything I need to know. Painless and easy. Well...painless for me.”

The guards moved forward and held Jim’s arm still against the chair. They pulled up the sleeve of his uniform so hard that it ripped. Jim fought and shook his head, gripping his hand in a fist and trying to jerk it free, but their grip created immediate bruising and was not the kind to be broken. Marco hummed to himself and lined the needle up with Jim’s vein in the crook of his elbow. Jim groaned through gritted teeth as the needle slid into his skin. Spock could only watch, helpless as Marco ejected the entire syringe and withdrew the needle. The guards released Jim and he slumped forward, groaning. Blood trickled down the fresh bruises on his forearm. 

“Jim!” Spock begged, not caring anymore about their roles. His mate and Captain sat there, shaking against harsh restraints while his chest heaved and he groaned over and over. His energy was gone, but the drug continued pummeling through his body. Jim’s eyes were clenched shut and he cried out in high moans. Sweat gathered on his forehead and ran down his face along with the dried blood it loosened. His chest heaved irregularly. The muscles in his neck strained, and Spock could see the too rapid pulse beating in his throat. 

“Look at him go!” Marco laughed. “Look at him fighting it! Oh I knew he would try it. They always do. But he _really_ doesn’t want to talk, does he...”

“Jim, look at me,” Spock said loudly. He was livid and shaking himself. The absolute horror and irredeemable violation of having your mind ripped into and rifled through without your control was a crime so grievous that Spock now had the right by Vulcan law to crush Marco’s skull if he wanted. For Jim, who kept such unimaginable traumas behind mental barriers, and who knew numerous secrets and plans of Starfleet, Spock knew he was in agony trying to control the drug’s effect. And without any strength to do so. The fear and pain ripping through the bond was making Spock dizzy. He shook his head, trying to clear it, while screaming Jim’s name through gritted teeth. 

“This one really cares for you, doesn’t he?” Marco watched Spock out of the corner of his eye. He yanked Jim’s head up by his hair again. Jim’s entire face was contorted in pain and effort, his neck flushed deep red.

“Tell me,” Marco said. “Do you love your First Officer?”

Spock screamed in his head at the injustice facing Jim, the sheer cruelty. Jim’s chest heaved and it was now fully damp with sweat through his uniform. He spit in Marco's face and received a harsh backhand that sent fresh blood across his face. He hissed through his teeth, trying to disguise the “yes,” but Marco heard it anyway and squealed in laughter.

“Oh, this is too perfect! What a treat. I could play with you all day, Captain. Unfortunately, I need answers before your heart stops. Just one more, though. One more. I can’t help myself. Do you let him fuck you, hmm? Do you beg for it like a little whore?”

Spock wrenched his torso against the restraints holding him. He growled, unable to help himself. The bond flamed and antagonized him for not protecting his mate, for letting this creature torment Jim about something so pure and private. He could barely hear Jim’s affirmative response or Marco’s laughter over the rushing in his own ears. 

“I knew it, I knew it!” Marco clapped his hands. “I just _knew_ you were the submissive slut type. Oh, that’s just perfect. Okay, okay, I’m done. Now. What do I have to do to defeat the Federation?”

Jim gasped and held his breath. Then, in obvious pain, he burst into laughter, despite the drugs surging through his body. His pale face was streaked with sweat, and the deep shadows under his eyes were growing darker. But he laughed and cried, and Spock's jaw clenched helplessly as he watched.

“Defeat the Federation?” Jim gasped. “You can’t defeat the Federation, you fucking moron. How’s that for truth?”

Marco sneered and yanked Jim’s head back by his hair, exposing his long throat and drawing a loud groan from Jim. “How do I keep them away from my planet?”

Jim choked at the angle of his neck pulled back and shook his head in Marco’s grasp. His voice squeezed out of his throat in a painful rasp. “You can’t. Not anymore. Before, you could have negotiated. Now after this attack, the Federation will only send more reinforcements than before in order to protect the citizens you’re trying to kill rather than allow them to fight for a better way of life.”

Marco sneered again above Jim. Dangerously. “What are the command codes to the Enterprise’s shield array?”

Jim gasped halfway through another choked laugh and grit his teeth. The sudden switch of questions caught him unguarded. Spock froze for a second himself and then restarted his assault against the restraints. Jim could not lie through this one. There was no way. Jim’s entire body was shaking, tight as a coil. His fists pulled at the bindings. His mouth opened and closed.

“Tell me!” Marco pulled Jim's hair harder until his throat was bared to the ceiling. Jim's body thrashed as oxygen was cut off. When Marco let up a little, he wheezed and gasped.

“I thought you...wanted to keep the Federation out...out of your business? You blow up my ship and kill my crew and it’s a guaranteed suicide. Starfleet will hunt you down if I don’t kill you first myself.”

Marco leaned close to Jim’s sweaty face. Jim was forced to stare at the ceiling, almost entirely behind him, but he refused to look at Marco. The painful tremors in his body had grown uncontrollable. Marco observed this with pleasure.

“You’re not answering my question, Captain.”

Jim screamed through gritted teeth. He groaned and gasped like he was dying for air. And then without warning he shouted out, “A61P5270.”

“Is that correct?” Marco shoved Jim’s head free and whirled around toward Spock, his eyes ecstatic. Jim gasped hard and coughed, sputtering. He twisted his neck, trying to breathe. His body slumped forward and his whole body shook as he coughed. He sat limp against the restraints and Spock was afraid he'd fallen unconscious again.

Spock glared at Marco and hardened his entire body. “Yes.” 

He would not think about what Jim had been forced to say, what he had revealed, lest it ruminate in the bond and affect Jim’s ability to control his thoughts. He only spared a brief second of triumph and support in his mind for Jim and the sheer ingenuity of giving the codes selected for the refit of the Enterprise. Codes that could easily now be changed. He had not lied, since the codes were technically correct. 

Marco leered. “We’ll see about that.”

The man slicked back a section of gelled hair that had shaken loose in his assault on Jim. He pulled a phaser from inside his jacket and held it down in front of Jim’s face. He smacked Jim with it to get his fading consciousness to focus. 

“See this? Fun toy. This is also from the Orions. Bio phaser. _Highly_ toxic. So much more exhilarating than plain ole plasma. Should I try it out on your boyfriend? Can you stay alive long enough for that while we wait for your ship to return?”

Jim groaned from his position drooped over in the chair. His shoulders shook with each breath he fought to take in. Spock used the fury raging in his mind to reach out to the guard nearest him, to breach his thoughts. He focused hard and planted the suggestion to _move closer._ Jim’s weak moans urged him further, drove the intensity of his mental instruction. The guard slowly approached Spock, and Marco continued to taunt Jim with the phaser. 

Then Marco straightened and pointed he phaser at Spock, telling Jim to watch closely, Spock froze. He hadn’t finished in time. Jim’s eyes shot up, wide in fear. He couldn't lift his head far, and he was rasping the word “no” over and over as he fought to focus on Spock. With one last effort, Spock sent the commanding thought: _Move in front of me. Now._ And as the phaser discharged, the guard did just that, stepping in front of Spock and taking the full force of the blast in his gut. He toppled at Spock’s feet. Chaos erupted as Marco shrieked furiously.

Spock tipped himself over in the chair, hitting the floor hard. One of the legs of the chair broke, and while he worked his foot free, he shuffled the chair closer to grab the knife he’d seen at the guard’s belt. Marco was screaming at the other guard to take Jim away, and then he was launching himself at Spock. Spock had used precious seconds to free his hands and arms with the knife, slicing his skin in the process, but succeeding. And as Marco landed on Spock, phaser aimed for his throat, Spock turned the knife so Marco’s full weight landed onto it. It entered the man’s body with a piercing heaviness. Marco gasped, trying to find a hold on Spock’s shoulders, on the floor, anywhere. Spock shoved Marco off of him in fury and disgust, untying the last of the ropes binding him to the chair while he watched the injured man grapple at the blade in his stomach. 

“Noooo!” Marco snarled through blood, trying to roll over and reach for Spock. Spock backhanded him so hard he nearly twisted the man’s neck and killed him. And he wanted to finish the job. He stood growling, his body tight and defensive. He looked up to see that the other guard had freed Jim and now held him in front like a body shield. His forearm wrapped around Jim and pressed his neck. He held a phaser to Jim’s head and backed up slowly, dragging Jim on faltering feet along with him. Jim was choking, trying to pull himself up by the arm crushing his throat. Spock saw his lips form his name, gasping silently. 

“Stand down,” the man warned. “Or your Captain gets it for good this time.” 

Spock’s mind raced in fury. He had no choice. Not when Jim’s life was in such clear jeopardy. He relaxed his stance while glaring at Jim’s captor and panting through his nose. Jim blinked twice. A message of understanding.

“Good,” the man sneered. He lowered the phaser to his side while he looked behind him on where to go next. Jim let one hand free and reached around to the phaser. He grabbed it and fired straight down, taking the man’s foot in a spray of blood. Through the screaming, they both fell, and Jim rolled away as fast as he could, phaser trained on the man who now grabbed his leg and snarled curses at the both of them. Jim stayed on his side, coughing and gasping. The phaser shook wildly in his grasp. Spock was at his side immediately, taking him up and slinging one of Jim’s arms over his shoulder. He grabbed Jim around the waist with his other hand, and aided him in a short run from the premises. Jim held onto the phaser the whole way. 

They were both near the exit of the room and the whole building itself when Jim glanced over his shoulder. 

“Down!” he shouted. He pushed Spock to the ground, falling gracelessly beside him. Phaser fire flew over their heads, just missing them. Again and again. Spock looked back to see Marco crawling across the floor in a pile of blood, his bio phaser in his hand, firing at them with all he had left. Spock took Jim’s weapon from him and aimed once, stunning Marco in the chest. Jim, even in his drug overdosed pain and disorientation, had changed the setting to stun. Spock both loved him and admired him, and wanted to throttle him. 

“Come,” he said, lifting Jim from the floor as they began their escape once again. Spock knew more militants would arrive from the noise, and that they had to find a secure location to hide and wait for the Enterprise. He and Jim stumbled across the gravel hillside, blinking at the bright light of the outdoors. They made their way up, following the trail but looking for a place to divert. When they slid on the loose ground, Jim squeezed Spock’s wrist at his shoulder.

“I’m okay,” he wheezed. “Let go. Use the tricorder. Find us a place.” Because of course, he knew Spock had grabbed his confiscated equipment before they ran. Spock grudgingly released Jim and instead listened to his heavy breathing behind him as he scanned the perimeter.

“No life signs following us,” Spock said. “Readings show a small cave entrance a few kilometers north.”

He trudged on and kept an eye on Jim, glancing back every other few steps. Jim had his face toward the ground, watching his step as they climbed. Sweat and blood dripped from his skin. He groaned occasionally and gripped his side, panting. But Spock knew they could not stop. The Enterprise would return in 71 minutes, and they needed to stay hidden until then. Which meant finding shelter. 

When at long last they reached the entrance to the cave Spock had found, Jim staggered inside and collapsed. His body shook, dragging the gravel and dirt in place. His teeth chattered and he clenched his jaw, groaning with eyes squeezed shut. Spock set aside his panic and fury and instead sent comfort and safety through to Jim as he dropped to his side. He gently rolled Jim onto his back and felt the racing pulse at his throat.

“Shhh, Jim. We are safe, t’hy'la. The Enterprise will be here soon. Stay with me.” 

He smoothed the sweaty hair back at Jim’s forehead and wiped the blood from his face. He opened Jim’s eyelids and saw the pinprick pupils were now dilated wide, taking up almost all of his eyes in only a thin rim of blue. Spock calmed his mind and ran his hands over Jim’s arms and sides in comfort, squeezing his hands and then rubbing back up to his shoulders. Jim’s chest and neck arched as he shook and gasped in pained moans. Spock nearly missed the blood until he saw it on his hands. He’d mistaken it for sweat, which Jim was soaked in, but there was fresh blood also. He pulled aside Jim’s collar and gasped.

Deep in his left shoulder near his neck, a large phaser burn ran through his skin. It was blistered black and bleeding slowly. Carefully, Spock slipped Jim’s arms through the sleeves of his uniform and pulled it over his head. He pillowed it under Jim’s head with shaking hands, cursing at what Jim’s bare, shuddering torso revealed. 

“No,” he whispered. “Oh Jim, no.”

Another phaser wound splayed along his left side under his ribs. Both wounds displayed burning flesh, but at Spock’s dismay, he noticed infected skin around the burns. And spreading slowly. Dark blue veins crept out in every direction from the wounds. Spock brought his hand close to Jim’s waist to look closer. He touched his stomach where the poison was spreading, and Jim jolted, arching his back further with a sharp cry. Spock caught him and lowered him while whispering apologies. Jim was still delirious, eyes open but unfocused and becoming hazy. His bare chest heaved in uneven gasps. Sweat trickled down his throat and over his chest, his torso. His muscles clenched and shuddered uncontrollably. His hands shook in the dirt at his sides. He was unable to control his pained cries.

"Sp-o-oc-ck," Jim gasped, driving his head back into the dirt. "Wh-a-a-t-'s ha-happen-ing?"

“You've been poisoned, Jim. Can you hear me?” Spock asked softly. “I know. I know it hurts. Can you hear me, ashayam? I am right here. I am here with you. Hold on, my Jim.” 

Spock rolled Jim onto his side as carefully as he could, holding him steady as he lurched and seized in the dirt. Across the broad muscles of Jim's back, his skin was coated in dirt, sticking to him in sweat. The entry wound burned through his shoulder blade, bleeding steadily and spreading dark veins outward along his back. The gash in his side farther down was also spreading poison across his lower back. The ugly veins spidered and grew toward his spine even as Spock watched. He had no choice but to lay Jim back down and keep working through this new horror.

He kept talking, not even aware of what he was saying as he ran desperate tricorder readings of Jim’s fluctuating vitals. The toxins from the bio phaser were spreading too fast. Fever was taking over his body at an alarming rate, and his pulse hammered frantically. The toxins increased coverage in the spreading veins under Jim’s skin, growing like an infestation. They spidered out from his shoulder up his throat, over into his arm, and down along his chest. The toxins released in the wound near his waist crept along his ribs and belly, down toward his hip. The tricorder readings showed they would reach Jim’s heart in 43 minutes. Long before the Enterprise reached them if Spock could not make contact. 

“Rai. No, this cannot happen,” he whispered. “Unacceptable. No. No. I will not lose you. I _cannot._ ”

He stood to his feet and paced, trying and failing to keep the sound of Jim’s rattling breaths out of his head. He had to reconfigure the communicator. But would it work... Could he do it in time... He must. There was no other acceptable alternative.

Spock sat on the ground by Jim’s side. He took Jim’s dirty face in his hands and tried to reach him through he bond, which felt foggy and weighted in drowning pain. _I am here, Jim,_ he pressed. _I am here. Sleep now and rest your body. I am guarding you. All will be well, ashal-veh._.

Jim’s head tossed in Spock's hands as he shook. He blinked sweat from his eyes, even as they rolled into the back of his head. His chest jolted in spasms. Fractured moans vibrated in his throat. Spock grasped his hand and gave Jim the smile he knew he loved, the one Jim lovingly teased him about since he’d always proclaimed that “Vulcans do not smile.” He saw the gesture register in Jim’s gaze as he refocused his eyes for a second, and then they closed. Even unconscious, his body continued shaking, though not as violently. He gasped for breath occasionally, tossing his head in fevered delirium. Spock stayed near and broke apart the communicator while he monitored the time. He has done this only once before and the conditions had not been ideal then either. 

More than anything, Spock hoped the militant group would not locate them. If they knew the terrain, then the location Spock had chosen would be an obvious place to look. And Spock knew this. He’d wanted to travel further, but knew Jim would not last the journey. It would have to make do. If he could contact the Enterprise to return, then it would not matter anyway. And if he could not, then he could not help Jim either. And that was something he refused to consider. He rearranged wires and connectors with furious speed. He had nearly crushed Kahn’s skull when Jim had been taken from him. He would not lose now to something as elementary as a communicator device. But time...that was something he could not fight. He would fight it anyway. 

Nearly 10 minutes had passed when Spock hastily reassembled the communicator and hailed on all frequencies. He rose from the ground and went to the entrance of the cave, trying again. The static he heard was better than nothing. He tried repeatedly and finally heard Uhura’s voice. It broke in and out, but he spoke his message several times over in hopes she would receive it. _Urgent assistance required. Captain mortally wounded. Transmitting location._

Jim gasped hard behind him. Spock rushed to him and his eyes flew open, still dilated and hazed, but full of panic. His face was pale and shadowed and he shook his way free when Spock tried to put his hand on his face. He pushed up on shaky arms and looked around the cave frantically.

“Where are they?” Jim rasped. His voice was thready and weak, but shook with a fierceness Spock recognized all too well. 

“Where are they?” Jim demanded again. “Where are my kids? What...what have you done with them?”

He glared at Spock and struggled to stay upright even as Spock felt his heart slam in his side. His jaw dropped and he heard a wounded sound leave his throat. He shook his head and tried to reach out slowly. Jim’s damaged shoulder gave out and he slid with a whimper, but he wouldn’t give up. His chest heaved frantically and he groaned in pain.

“Does Kodos have them?” he breathed. Naked fear flooded his features. His eyes filled with tears even as sweat continued running down his face. He didn’t seem to notice his condition.

“Jim,” Spock managed brokenly. “Jim, you are not on Tarsus. You are not there anymore. K..Kodos is not here.”

Jim slumped against the cave wall, his chest shaking as he shook his head. His eyes blinked wide, seeing another world. “You don’t understand,” he whispered. “You don’t know what he’ll do to them. I have to go. I’m the only one who can make him stop. He likes me. He...he’ll let them go if I stay and give him what he wants.”

“Oh Jim,” Spock breathed. His mind shattered in rage and grief as the bond screamed at him to do something. He reached out and took Jim in his arms even as he thrashed weakly and tried to push away. Jim’s body burned with heat. His bare torso slipped in Spock’s hold from the sweat. His hair was drenched and spiky. Spock hated having to clamp a hand gently over Jim’s mouth as he shouted. He hushed and held Jim close and rocked. He pressed warmth and safety through the bond. Back and forth. He pressed himself, his identity and his truth through to Jim. Over and over. Jim’s shouts turned to sobs, sinking Spock’s heart further. Jim was already too dehydrated. He couldn’t stand to lose any more liquid than what his fevered body was already expelling.

“Please don’t make me go to him,” Jim cried. “Please don’t...I can feel him everywhere...it hurts so much. Please don’t let him touch me again. I have to save them but I’m so afraid. I know how much it’s going to hurt. I know it...I know it...and no one is coming to save us...no one...no one...”

Spock felt himself openly crying, even though he didn’t remember letting down that last barrier. The bond thrashed between them, exploding in blinding light, trying to reach Jim and comfort him, but hitting an invisible wall. The drugs and toxins racing through Jim’s body would allow no other stimuli to enter. His mind was awash with memories and agony and fear and abandonment. As much as Spock slammed against his mind, trying to shove in light and stability, Jim’s mindspace remained turbulent. A chemical chaos.

“He will _never_ hurt you again, t’hy'la. That monster will _never_ touch you again. I _swear_ it, my Jim. He is gone.”

“Come in...” Spock’s communicator crackled through the static again. He grasped it while still holding Jim sprawled in his lap. “Enter...ise. Do you ...opy?”

“This is Spock to Enterprise. Please come in. Please come in. Repeat.” Spock’s hands shook nearly as hard as the tremors wracking Jim’s body. His voice sounded only marginally stronger.

“Come in. Request immediate beam out. Fix in my location. The Captain is critically injured. Time is of essence. Copy.”

“Enterprise confirmed.” Uhura’s voice was clearer now. Enough for Spock to hear her concern over the professionalism. “Will rendezvous at your coordinates in 4 minutes. Reinforcements arriving to secure militant group area. Prepare for transport. Do you copy.”

“Copy,” Spock cried over and over. “Confirmed. Please hasten.” He kept the communicator open in Jim’s lap as he held his beloved’s head tight under his chin. Jim’s body was tense, unable to relax against Spock as he lurched and shook. Spock observed the poisonous wounds in tremulous dismay. The blue veins had nearly reached the entire length of Jim’s neck , reaching as the chords in his throat tensed so hard they looked like his pulse could leap from under his skin. More poisonous veins stretched erratically to the middle of his chest and were spreading further down his upper arm, over the bruises left by the guards and the bleeding needle puncture. And the infection from the wound on his side was snaking up to meet it. Higher along his ribs and across to his navel and below. The veins disappeared below his hip under the line of his pants. And all the veins had darkened further still, claiming Jim’s skin as they spread. The entire left side of his body was mottled and turning gray under the dark veins. Jim lurched violently in Spock's arms. His abdominal muscles tightened painfully, making the trails of poison dance along his skin under the sheen of sweat. His back burned against Spock’s chest and his head lolled back onto Spock’s shoulder. The chords in his neck rippled as he seized and shook in Spock’s arms. Spock tried to hold him steady, keep him from hurting himself. He forced Jim's jaw open to make sure he wasn't biting his tongue. Spock stroked his face and gazed at him in agony, whispering his name over and over. Jim’s eyes were bloodshot, showing similar veins spreading across the whites of his eyes. His breath rattled and shook. Spock kissed his dry lips and pressed his nose alongside Jim’s, willing his contact to reach Jim’s katra, command it to hold on. Jim’s open mouth gasped into Spock’s. A particularly violent seizure gripped him and he choked out a scream against Spock’s lips.

“Prepare to transport,” Uhura announced. And almost as if in result, Jim’s eyes slipped closed and his breath caught in his throat, stalling. Air escaped his lungs and he deflated in Spock’s arms, falling limp. Spock could still feel the deep tremors set in his limbs along with his racing pulse, but his chest was hardly moving. His breaths were so shallow Spock couldn’t hear them. And as phaser fire erupted far below them in the valley, particle light surged around them to bring them home. Spock gripped Jim’s body close and materialized sitting on the sickbay floor. He would thank Uhura every day for beaming them straight there. 

Spock struggled and failed to get to his feet with Jim in his arms, but Doctor McCoy was there waiting. He and Nurse Chapel helped him up, knowing better than to try and take Jim from him. Together, they all got him onto the bed and began work. McCoy wasn’t even shouting, just swearing under his breath and dispensing hypo after hypo into Jim’s sweaty neck as he glared at his tricorder readings. An orderly was wiping the sweat and blood from Jim’s face, neck, and torso. The wounds at his shoulder and side were carefully avoided. McCoy was taking things from other orderlies as they were handed to him, and Nurse Chapel strategically hooked Jim up with needles and monitors. Spock grimaced from where he stood off at the side. The sight of needles being inserted into Jim’s wrists and elbow again made him nauseous. Monitor pads placed on Jim’s chest wouldn’t stick, and kept sliding from the sweat covering his skin. He was shaking again and the tremors were growing stronger. His head thrashed back and forth weakly on the already damp pillow. Even though Spock knew he was burning and flushed with fever, his skin was gray and nearly matched the bedding. McCoy’s face kept growing more and more stern.

“He’s burning up,” McCoy said. “Get me some ice packs. Stat.”

“No!” Jim suddenly gasped. “No needles. Please. I...have to see them. I need to see...Don’t strap me down.”

Jim’s chest was expanding so full and so fast that he was in near hysterics. Air see-sawed in and out of his lungs. His eyes were wide, but unseeing. He tried to jerk free from McCoy’s grip on his arm, then more violently as another orderly grabbed him and pressed his chest down. 

“No! Let me go!” Jim shouted. "Please!"

“Jim, you’re not there!” McCoy leaned close to his ear as Jim cried in pain and fright. “It’s Bones, Jim! You’re on the Enterprise. You’re Captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise. NCC-1701. Do you know where you are, Jim?”

“SPOCK!” Jim screamed. And Spock was already moving, taking Jim’s face in his hands and focusing his wide eyes on his. The bloodshot veins filled almost the entire whites of his eyes now, and the beautiful crystal blue of his irises was nearly completely lost to blown pupils. They were losing him.

“I am here, Jim. I am here. Right here. You are safe.”

“Escaped?” Jim gasped. His head arched out of Spock’s hands and he let out a long, sharp cry. Heaving breaths brought more cries of pain. Spock tried to hold him still, tried to reach him over the poisons literally ripping him away. 

“Yes, ashal-veh,” Spock sobbed out a whisper. “We escaped. We are both safe now. And you must rest. Doctor McCoy is going to take care of you. You must rest now. There is no need to fight, ashayam.”

“Bones,” Jim rasped. He has fallen limp on the bed now, his entire body tightening and seizing without strength. His muscles abused and traumatized, his eyes scrunched shut in pain. 

“Yes,” Spock whispered. “Yes. Rest now. We are here.” 

He kissed Jim’s cheek and then his mouth, completely unashamed at such affection given the circumstances. Jim’s breath deflated from his lungs in a pained sigh. His head rolled limp in Spock’s hold. Spock didn’t want to let him go. Beside him, Chapel cut off Jim’s pants and removed the fabric. She grabbed the ice packs she was handed and situated them at critical locations under Jim’s armpits, along his groin and thighs, against his neck. Jim, in unconscious delirium, gasped at the temperature, trying to arch away from the burning freeze. Constricted gasps left his throat as he tossed his head. Spock smoothed his thumbs over Jim’s cheekbones.

“Shhh, darlin,” McCoy muttered. “Spock, get outta here. Let us work. No buts—I mean it, goddamn it. Go get changed. Take five. Then come back.”

Spock spared one more second staring at Jim’s face. He released him and clenched his fists, his body as tight as Jim’s, but straight as a rod except for his hunched shoulders. He knew the Doctor would throw him out if he did not leave willingly. McCoy would stabilize Jim. He always did. Spock needed to trust that and give them a few moments. He still growled deep in his throat and turned on his heel. Everyone in the corridor averted their eyes as he stormed past. One ensign stopped and waited, opening his mouth to ask a question, and then clamped his lips and darted away. When Spock entered his quarters and the door closed, he took two steps and smashed a steel cabinet with his fist. 

The bridge hailed him and he put Uhura on audio only. "What is the status of the militant occupation, Lieutenant?”

“Subdued and underway, sir. The renegade, Marco, has been arrested and is in custody being treated by medics. Starfleet has already recovered enough evidence of drug smuggling and terrorism to put him away for life after a full confession.”

“Might I make an official recommendation for Starfleet to use his own truth serum for interrogation?” Spock ground out.

“I...will make it noted, sir,” Uhura replied. 

“Keep me informed, Lieutenant. Spock out.”

Spock knew of course that the drug would never be administered to anyone again now that Starfleet had confiscated it. He ripped his dirty uniform off and threw it in the laundry chute, stepping into the shower. He let precious hot water stream down his body as he leaned forward with his hands on the shower wall. His head drooped down, letting water spill over his forehead into his eyes and mouth. He stared at the floor, listened to the water beating his back, and focused on one deep breath after another. Again and again, until he thought of Jim fighting for each strangled breath in sickbay, and he let out a furious shout, pressing his forehead to the wall. He needed to be there. He could be Jim’s breath. When he returned in a few moments and McCoy had Jim stabilized, he could reach through the bond again and attempt more support. This task must be available to him, lest he sit at Jim’s bedside and grow insane.

He stepped from the shower and dried himself quickly. In their bedroom, he pulled on a fresh uniform and froze halfway through adjusting his blue shirt. On their bed, one of Jim’s spare uniform shirts lay discarded where Jim had tossed it last night. He’d joked dramatically this morning that he was too tired to put it away and would do it later that evening. Spock picked it up and pressed the gold material to his face, filling his nose with Jim’s scent. He gripped the shirt and breathed heavily into it, trying to center himself. Then he placed it back on the bed where Jim had left it, and hurried to Sickbay without another look back. His mate needed him.

_____________________________

“It’s not good, Spock.”

Of the many things Spock had anticipated Doctor McCoy to say, this was not one of them. He clenched his hands behind his back. They stood together at the foot of Jim’s bed while orderlies continued monitoring and adjusting ice packs and wiping sweat from his body.

“Explain.”

McCoy sighed and placed a hand on his hip while he glared at his chart. “I got an immediate sample of that damn truth serum Starfleet confiscated, and was able to work up a quick antidote for that, so that’s good. Between it and that ketamine overdose, though, I’m still flushing drugs out of his system. It’s this strange bio toxin, though. I’ve analyzed the poison and it’s a hybrid clusterfuck. I can’t isolate it enough to formulate a working antidote.”

Spock forced the trembling from his hands as he approached Jim’s side. Amidst a myriad of tubes and monitor attachments, Jim struggled weakly on the bed. He wore only his boxer briefs and still, his temperature peaked at a deadly height. His tremors continued, though, as if he were freezing. His bare skin glistened in sweat as he shook, rippling across hard muscles. His closed eyelids fluttered, eyes moving incessantly beneath in delirium while he grimaced and contorted in pain. His dry lips parted as he sucked in air, but he was wheezing, like his throat was constricted and couldn’t take in oxygen. And every successful breath he was rewarded with rattled in his chest. The poison spreading through his veins had progressed further. The ugly blue infection spiderwebbed over an alarming area of his skin out in all directions from the two wounds. The dark veins spread up his jaw and across the left side of his face, and deeper along his chest, closer and closer to his heart. The poison approached from below his heart, too, with veins snaking up his ribs from the deep gash in his side. The wounds themselves appeared deeper and blacker, the skin peeling as if chemically burned, and the flesh underneath charring and still bleeding. White ointment had been pressed into the wounds and settled in the deep crevices of open flesh. Even if Spock fully melded with Jim, he knew he would not be able to grasp the full agony of such wounds, nor the poison burning its way through Jim’s veins.

Spock placed his hand on the side of Jim’s sweaty face, the side not surging with toxins, and Jim melted into the touch. His head jerked in spasms as he tried to increase contact with Spock. His chest rattled. The bond surged, and Spock leaned over Jim farther, taking his face in both hands and pressing his forehead to Jim’s. He swarmed through Jim’s meld points with comforting warmth and love. _Reassurance. Devotion. Protection. Not alone. never alone._ Jim reached back feebly, unable to make contact. _Fear. Stabbing pain. Can’t breathe. Can’t stop. What is this. Help._

“I don’t know if he’s going to wake up again before this is all over, Spock,” McCoy said. Spock turned his head slightly, even as he continued wrapping Jim’s mind in comfort.

“We’re keeping the poison at bay, so at least it’s spreading slower. But it’s still spreading. And Kahn’s blood is both helping and hurting matters. Its antibodies are fighting, but wreaking havoc on Jim’s immune system in the process. He’s growing weaker and weaker with exhaustion. I know he’s in there holding on, but he can’t fight forever. It’s now a matter of time between what stops his heart first: the poison itself or his body’s fight against it.”

“Have you tested any of the antibodies you’ve created yet?” Spock whispered. “Is there discernible progress to a solution?”

“I’ve got everyone working on it,” McCoy said. “And then some. We’re going to find it. It’s just trial and error. And goddamn time we don’t have.”

“How long?”

“Spock, I can’t say—”

“How long, Doctor?”

McCoy rubbed his face with his hand and sighed. When he pulled his hand away, he looked years older. He wouldn’t meet Spock’s eye and couldn’t even look at Jim, but stared at the ground.

“Three hours. He’s got three hours before he's too far gone for me to help.”

Spock’s body found the chair an orderly had situated for him. His arms and legs grew numb before he told himself to breathe again. 120 minutes of life left. That could not be accurate.

“I should help." His voice didn't sound like his. 

“No.” McCoy shook his head. “I need you with him. Keep trying to reach him. I trust you to let me know if anything happens faster than these monitors will. I’m heading back to the labs now. You call me _immediately_ if anything changes.”

Spock could only nod. He did not trust his voice. He moved closer to Jim’s side as McCoy left and barked orders to the remaining nurse techs. Jim’s damp hand shook in Spock’s as he held it to his chest. The back of his hand curled against Spock’s sternum, and Spock willed the contact to reach him. With his other hand, Spock took up a cool washcloth and pressed it to Jim’s brow, then his neck—careful of the side covered in the ugly blue veins. His skin was so hot to the touch. He caressed Jim’s chest with it carefully, gathering all the sweat at his collarbones and base of the throat. Then he discarded it and placed his palm flat over Jim’s breast, on top of his heart that raced irregularly inside. He kept his hand there, while holding Jim’s trembling hand to his own chest. Then he bowed his head. He closed his eyes and listened to Jim’s erratic breaths, his whimpers and fevered moans. He felt the crackling inside Jim’s chest, felt it heave and collapse under his hand in panicked intervals. _Hold on_ , he pleaded. He searched for Jim’s faltering consciousness and grasped hold of it with his own steady presence. In this half-meld, Spock was aware of movement around him, orderlies monitoring Jim’s vitals. But none disturbed him. He did not move from this task until over an hour later when he identified McCoy’s voice in the room.

The Doctor approached Jim’s side with a syringe that he injected into the port taped to Jim’s elbow. He stared at the monitor screen above Jim’s head and breathed silently for a few minutes, just staring and not moving. Then he slammed the empty syringe onto a tray and sent instruments clattering on the floor.

“Godfuckingdamnit it,” he hissed, and stormed from sickbay without another word as the orderlies silently cleaned up the mess. Spock closed his eyes and re-entered the meld with a shaking heart.

Twice more this occurred and sent McCoy’s fury darker and darker. His haggard face was pale and lined with fear. He grew more and more quiet with each failed antidote, his emotions tapped under a determination of outrage and utter refusal to give up. The nurses and orderlies could no longer make out his muttered cursing, but Spock could, and the Doctor’s lexicon was becoming more and more creative. 

After 2 hours and 15 minutes of time Jim no longer had, the effect was devastating. His chest did not heave at all under Spock’s hand now. It just gave tiny gasps that were unnoticeable to the eye. The deep shadows in his face were made more stark against his ashen white complexion and the horrible veins that crept there. Heat still radiated from his skin, and five times, orderlies had changed his bedding, letting Spock simply lift his limp and fading mate while they exchanged sweat-soaked sheets and pillows for fresh ones. His eyes fluttered under his eyelids, but never opened. Moving only because of the poison claiming his body and thrashing deep within. Jim’s heart rate now crawled at nothing more than some obscure fight to keep going. As if each shuttering bit of air he gained could be the last he dragged into his lungs. As if each whimper that caught in his throat could be his final utterance. Spock listened to the quiet wheeze of Jim's slow gasps, holding onto even his tortured respiration as a sign of life. Every now and then, Jim's breath stopped for around 6 seconds. And just as Spock panicked, a horrid rattle would sound in his chest and award him a miniscule amount of air. The fight against the poison had critically compromised his vitals, leaving them utterly depleted. Jim was moments away from death now. Spock knew his t’hy'la was fighting, just clinging onto Spock’s own thread of consciousness he fed him. But even Jim could not hold on forever on willpower alone. Not if his body betrayed him. Spock’s mind burned in the effort and exhausting concentration of holding Jim’s life in his hands. But he would not let go. He would die here at Jim’s side along with him when his own body gave out from the strain before he let go. And so he was barely aware when McCoy entered a final time.

He opened his eyes to watch the Doctor silently administer yet another attempt at a miracle. McCoy did not watch the monitor screen for a few moments. He stared at Jim’s sunken face pinched tight and pained in fever, and just listened to his machines. Spock could not find it within himself to do anything different.

But then Jim’s chest rose under his hand. Not drastically. Not functionally. But more than it had so far that hour. Then it rose again. Minuscule gasps of air. The limp, damp hand he’d held to his chest the entire time twitched. Not from tremors. Jim’s fingers shifted slowly against the back of his. A silent monitor near Spock’s head suddenly beeped. Then another. Steady beeps. McCoy was staring up at the monitor screen with watering eyes. His bottom lip quivered and he ran a shaking hand over his face. He raised his fist to punch the nearest wall, but stopped himself.

“Damn you, Jim Kirk,” he whispered. “You did it, you son of a bitch.”

Spock refocused his mind to Jim’s, still gripping Jim’s golden thread of consciousness, but now caressing it and letting his grieving relief flood wide in heavy, open sobs. Jim’s mind whispered back, a muted, utterly exhausted and pained greeting, unable to do anything but accept the onslaught of Spock’s emotion and let it wash over him.

______________________________

Jim remained unconscious for the next 4 days while his body regenerated from the ground up it seemed. His vitals grew stronger slowly, and as the poison was gradually worked from his blood, the dark veins began retracting. Bit by bit, they faded in the direction they’d spread, until only the immediate surface area around the wounds still showed infection. McCoy administered the ointment hourly, along with an impressive collection of hyposprays. He’d confessed to Spock that unfortunately, even when the skin was repaired, the wounds would never fully heal and would pain Jim occasionally for an indefinite amount of time. Spock would not accept this, but decided he would handle it in time and work through healing rituals himself to alleviate Jim’s pain. There were those on Vulcan who could do even more.

The needles remained in Jim’s wrists and elbow while he was hooked up to morphine and various hydrating fluids. The ice packs were no longer necessary, though they stayed nearby to be ready, and Jim’s skin was still flushed and sweaty as the fever fought off the last of the infections. Commander Scott would not let Spock return to full duty, but Spock now worked from Jim’s bedside on the backlog of reports that awaited him. To do so while he watched Jim sleep--peacefully for the first time in nearly a week--was more than he could ask for.

Except for a few matters. Such as the order for the immediate destruction of all bio phasers that Starfleet had confiscated, as well as a full investigative launch into the Orion cartel that smuggled them and the other drugs. Spock was kept in constant progress update. He sipped tea Nurse Chapel had brought him while he watched live feed footage of the security raid that infiltrated and brought down a drug operation, ending in over two dozen arrests. The night-vision camera zoomed in on open cases lined up along the floor, each packed with bio phasers and racks upon racks of different colored drugs. Spock allowed himself a small internal smile, and the bond seemed to accept it as beginning recompense enough. It hummed in satisfaction and sent waves of comfort through both of them. 

It was only late on the fifth day when Jim stirred in his sleep. He’d been clothed in a sickbay gown and had a blanket pulled to his hips where he laid on the inclined bed. He was clean and as comfortable as he could be made, and the golden hue was steadily returning to his face, though his eyes still held dark circles. The pillow was thick under his head, keeping it from lolling side to side in any lingering tremors. He groaned and clenched his eyes, his breath coming in weakly. In half a second, Spock had deposited the padd and was leaning over Jim, cupping the side of his hot face and gently hushing him.

“You are safe, my Jim. Slow breaths. You are all right. You can breathe. Just let your lungs work slowly. Do not let your heart rate increase. Shhhhh. I am here, ashal-veh. I have you. You are safe.”

Jim’s scrunched face fell in complete exhaustion. He couldn’t move his head, needing Spock to direct it with his hand on his cheek. Still, he tried to lean into the touch. The pained lines in his face relaxed slowly, though not entirely.

“Spock?” he sighed. 

“Yes, k'diwa. I am right here.”

“Spock?” 

“Can you open your eyes for me, Jim? Try and open your eyes and let me see you.”

Jim groaned and worked his eyelids. They fluttered open and met Spock’s gaze at a hazy half-mast. But they were clear. His beautiful blue irises shined brightly, though still not entirely to size with his pupils dilated from medication. To Spock, they could have lit a galaxy. Jim just stared at him and breathed shallowly, his chest hitching here and there. He focused on Spock in order to help him ease his breathing again while he blinked. Spock smiled at him. Openly smiled. Jim took it in and let the corner of his own mouth turn up.

“Must have...been...pretty bad...huh.” He had to take frequent, shallow breaths. “I feel like...after Kahn.”

His eyes squeezed shut again with a quiet moan. Spock pressed his cheekbone with his thumb, meeting the pain. He kissed Jim and breathed in his scent for a moment. For Jim to mention such a name, such a trauma, even in his unsteady frame of mind, was a testament to the toll his body had taken. Spock clenched his jaw and worked the image of that monster from his eyes. Jim was not dying. Not anymore. Not now. But at a cost.

“Yes,” he whispered against Jim’s skin. “You have been fighting off allergic drug reactions and poisoning. Your body suffered many seizures. It is why the soreness is so deep and severe. It will take time for the tremors to abate entirely, even if they are under the surface now.”

“Well...shit,” Jim managed. “Why does my...shoulder... and my side...feel...like it's on fire?”

Spock stroked his hair and kissed his forehead. “It is where you were wounded and where the poison entered your system. You are healing, and I am intervening against your pain when necessary.”

“Don’t do that.” Jim spoke too loudly and began coughing. He worked his eyes open, trying and failing to give his best glare. He was too weak to even turn his head, but Spock was there to hold him steady as he coughed and breathed through the pain.

"Shhhhh. You do not need to worry, k'diwa," Spock whispered. He took up Jim's hand, still limp and damp. 

Jim tried to keep his eyes open. "Can't help it. You...there's some...something else." He sighed and blinked hard. He squeezed Spock's hand, or probably thought he did. In reality, his fingers just shifted against Spock's.

"The bond." Jim moaned softly and clenched his eyes tight for a moment. "Sweetheart, tell me...what happened..."

Spock shook his head, but bowed it in submission. He should have known Jim would feel his distress, even while in such pain. He rubbed circles into Jim's palm and held it to his face. Jim managed to stroke his thumb on Spock's cheekbone, the same way Spock loved to do with him. With his other hand, Spock smoothed Jim's brow and stroked his hair. The mutual contact warmed them and offered healing.

"I..." Spock began. "You were delirious once you were injured with Marco's phaser. You...You believed you were on Tarsus again. You asked where the other children were, if Kodos had captured them. You claimed you needed to get to them because you could make Kodos stop by--"

"Enough," Jim gasped and closed his eyes. "I know the rest...I'm sorry...sorry you heard me say that." 

Spock shook his head again. "I was prepared for the possibility of it, given the state of your delirium. It made sense, my darling, though it pains me to admit it. Your mind was beyond my reach, and the poison was spreading faster than I could try to stabilize you."

It was Jim's turn to shake his head. "You did reach me...I...I felt you. I just...couldn't respond." He licked his dry lips. "I...we need to reset the...shield codes, don't we..."

Spock stroked Jim's forehead. "You did something even I would not have considered. The drug forced you to confess the codes, and you did. But not the current ones. You only gave up the refit plans, which Commander Scott has already changed. As...enraged as I was in the moment that your mind was being violated. Jim...you must understand that it is the equivalent to mental rape to use such tactics, and I thought only of... I wanted to rip that man's heart from his chest--even as he warned that yours would stop. And I was forced to watch it do nearly that... Yet I was so, so proud of you and should not have been surprised at all that you would conceive of something so brilliant. You truly do not believe in no-win scenarios."

Jim smiled sleepily. The morphine was pulling him back under. "Nope," he whispered. "You're learning."

Spock nodded. "You are teaching me, k'diwa. There was a time when I would have yielded to the logic of all situations. Now...where you are involved, there is nothing I would not do."

"Sounds...logical to me." Jim sighed deeply. He shifted his fingers in Spock's hand, stroking. Spock felt a swell of comfort and pride from the bond, an offering of Jim's most basic contentment through resting with this skin-to-skin contact. Spock returned it, watching Jim sigh again when it reached him and smoothed the lines from his face. And he basked in this comfort of sitting at his mate's side, watching over him and pushing protection and adoration around that golden, brilliant, exhausted mind. Wrapping it in warmth and home.

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own any Star Trek names or material.
> 
> Thanks for reading! If you have an idea for a situation of trouble for these two, feel free to let me know!


End file.
